The widespread use and advancement of telecommunication equipment and services have facilitated the dispersal of information of all types, including personal, business, governmental, educational, etc. It is not without question that there is a significant benefit to society when information of all types is readily available. While public and institutional libraries have been available for many decades for allowing access to the vast volumes of information, the access to such information was often burdensome and time consuming.
The popularity of the internet, and the access thereto in recent years, has enjoyed a great deal of success, due primarily to the ease of access and the ability to provide new and updated information and data on a daily or hourly basis. Moreover, with the abundance of home and office computers, and with the proliferation of internet service providers, access to all kinds of information can be readily had by a person at either the office or home using a computer, and at the convenience of the subscriber. A subscriber connected to the internet via a telephone line modem and service provider can browse through the various internet data bases, generally at only the cost of a connection to the internet service provider. With regard to internet subscribers, an internet connection is generally accomplished by the modem dialing a local number. The telephone operating companies thus do not obtain revenue therefrom, as such calls are often not of the toll or long distance type. The revenue obtained by the telephone operating companies for internet connections is generally only for leased lines from the internet service provider to the internet connection point. Despite that the local telephone operating companies have had to accommodate the additional load imposed on them for providing telephone connection services, very little, if any, additional revenue has been gained.
The internet architecture includes a government-installed network, termed the “backbone”, to which many governmental and educational institutions are directly connected. Accordingly, a vast amount of data and information is easily distributed throughout government and educational institutions by large mainframe computer data bases, without involving private or public telephone companies. In order for individuals and businesses other than those with internet mainframe computers to be connected to the backbone, many service providers, i.e., web sites, have become available for connecting subscribers to the internet. The web sites themselves also employ additional data bases which are accessible by any person wishing to access the internet. Generally, subscribers establish internet connections by dialing via analog modems to a modem “pool” that is served by a computer of the internet service provider. The web site computer then provides a connection appearance to the internet via a high speed leased line ultimately to the internet backbone. Each subscriber has a unique IP address, and each service provider has a unique address, such as mainhost.Cyberspace.net. In like manner, the address of the service provider is generally known as a domain name server. Similarly, each web site has a unique address, such as http://WWW.UH.edu. As noted above, while the local telephone operating companies do not obtain additional revenues from the subscribers during the connection to the internet, certain revenues are obtained for the high speed leased lines.
With the widespread use of the internet by many individuals using analog modems, substantial traffic burdens have been placed on the public telephone network, in that the local telephone operating company provides a switched network connection for each subscriber to reach the service provider. While such internet connections at the local central office do not involve any technical problems, such connections do indeed reduce the capability of the telephone companies to handle the routine telephone set traffic, especially during peak demand periods. It is well known that the traffic needs of telephone switching equipment are based on the statistical average of routine telephone calls. In practice, an average telephone-to-telephone call lasts approximately 100 seconds. Thus, based on the plain old telephone service (POTS), even at peak demand periods when the switching network may be operating at full capacity, a user does not need to wait for a very long period of time in order to complete a connection through the network to a destination, whether it be local or long distance. However, the telephone network connection provided for an internet subscriber lasts significantly longer than the nominal 100 seconds, and may remain for hours.
A central office connection provided by a local telephone company that is dedicated to a single subscriber for many hours thereby disrupts the statistical traffic demands that are normal for routine telephone calls. While the telephone operating companies can overcome this problem by expanding the central office switching equipment to accommodate more subscriber connections, such solution involves extremely costly equipment, space and time to install new switching equipment.
The information provided to internet subscribers often involves video data in the nature of graphics. In order to recreate pictures or graphical data on a CRT via a standard 28.8 K analog modem, a substantial amount of time is incurred in waiting for the transfer of large amounts of video data, as well as the display of the same on the CRT. This waiting period is due primarily to the bandwidth bottle-neck of the modems. While ISDN data links are available, and operate between 56 and 128 kilobits per second, the use thereof does not significantly overcome the waiting problem.
The bandwidth problem can be overcome by the use of optical fibers that are higher speed and more environmentally durable than the traditional twisted copper pairs. However, the installation of fiber optic transmission facilities is costly, and thus acceptance thereof has been generally limited to high traffic situations. There is, however, a continued growth of the use of fiber optic telecommunications into residential neighborhoods. An emerging technology in this area is called “fiber to the curb.” RELTEC Corporation of Bedford, Tex. is a leader in providing this new technology. Even with fiber optic capability extended to residential homes, apartments and businesses, the primary usage thereof is yet for routine telephone calls and computer modem traffic. As such, the fiber optic systems represents excess capabilities that are not used to the fullest extent.
It would be highly advantageous to utilize the high speed optical medium for computer network capabilities, especially in view that many residential homes and/or offices are equipped with computers and modems for accessing the internet as well as a host of other services. The networking of computers is a well-established function that allows a number of computers to communicate with each other according to a predefined protocol. One of the most popular network protocols is the Ethernet protocol, or otherwise known as the IEEE 802.3 standard. While this local area network protocol functions ideally in a local area, it is not easily expanded geographically without the use of expensive “network” bridges. The area limitations of the Ethernet protocol is based primarily on the “round trip timing” of signals carried on the network. This period of time is directly related to the physical length of the network medium and the time delay of electrical signals carried by the medium. According to the Ethernet standards, in order to minimize signal attenuation, each source or destination computer must be no further from the network than about 328 feet. The Ethernet protocol includes an algorithm to detect when two computers attempt to transmit data packets on the network at the same time and avoid the corresponding “collision” of signals. To date, there has been no acceptable solution for extending the geographical area of an Ethernet network without utilizing expensive bridges. While the use of bridges is widely known, such solution involves the receipt of the data packets, decoding the various fields and otherwise processing of the data fields themselves, and the attendant slowing down the transport speed of the overall data transmission.
From the foregoing, it can be seen that a need exists for a technique to provide users with connections to the internet, without tying up local central office switching equipment for long periods of time. A further need exists for the use of conventional equipment and software to provide such connections to internet services, without the need for new or expensive computer equipment or software protocols. Another need exists for a better utilization of fiber optic and other high speed data transmission facilities that are available to residential users. A significant need exists for extending data networks without the use of bridges and similar equipment while yet maintaining conformance to the appropriate protocol. Another need exists for providing an improved utilization of high speed data lines in extended data networks, and providing residential and other users further incentives to use high speed data services.